The present invention relates to a threaded joining assembly for joining a pair of structural members. The joining assembly includes a bolt and nut-like blind rivet which are adapted to be inserted into mounting holes of said pair of structural members and to be threadingly engaged to each other for joining said pair of structural members.
Such threaded bolt assemblies are known in the art. When the bolt of such a joining assembly is being threadingly engaged into the nut-like blind rivet made of a resiliently deformable material in order to join the structural members, a resiliently deformable portion of the blind nut is expanded to form a rivet bead which engages the adjacent structural member so as to join the structural members in an axial direction. If the rivet bead which is basically in the shape of an annular flange is relatively soft, the structural members may not be joined properly. If however the rivet bead is relatively hard, the rivet bead may become brittle so as to detrimentally affect the joining assembly. Generally spoken, the loading capability of such joining assembly is limited.
German Utility Model GM 201 12 171.9 of applicant discloses a threaded joining assembly comprising a bolt and a nut-like blind rivet comprising a sleeve-shaped lower part and a sleeve-shaped upper part of a wall thickness such that the lower part is highly flexible. The upper and lower parts are integrally connected by a shoulder portion of reduced wall thickness so that when the bolt is being threadingly engaged into the lower part of the blind rivet the wall of the upper part rolls along the outside of the lower part thereby to fold a rivet bead. This results in a reliable, highly resistant and durable joint between the structural members. A certain drawback of this threaded joining assembly is that the nut-like blind rivet is recessed due to the shoulder-shaped portion thereof which makes it difficult to manufacture the blind rivet by injection molding. As a result only a relatively limited number of blind rivets can be manufactured simultaneously, and injection molding of the blind rivets becomes relatively time consuming. In order to obtain threaded connection assemblies of sufficient strength, relatively large dimensions of the parts involved may be necessary.